Negotiating Political Power on Bornholm : The Anonymous Philander Letter and the Response of the Danish Absolutist State, 1737–1739

Abstract: This thesis studies the negotiation of political power between the Danish absolutist state, the local government on Bornholm, and its subjects there during the winter of 1738–1739. The aim is to better understand how political power was negotiated in a peripheral region of an early modern state, but also to explore what caused this interaction to begin with and why its eventual outcome was a compromise by the state. The empirical evidence consists mostly of documents created and obtained by an investigative commission formed by the Danish king in 1738 in response to an anonymous letter that accused the local government on Bornholm of corruption and serious criminal offences. The local government had become complicit in peasants’ squatting on disputed land that technically belonged to the king. It will be argued that there existed a distinct political culture on Bornholm that shaped these negotiations and their outcome. Furthermore, the work of the commission and the eventual compromise made by the state demonstrates how this political culture collided with Copenhagen officials’ designs for the island at the time. The investigation into the behaviour of the governor of Bornholm and his eventual treatment sheds light on the role and boundaries of such early modern local officeholders, but also reveals how officials such as him were protected by nepotism and kinship within the Danish absolutist state. Finally, it will be argued that the anonymous letter that led to the establishment of the commission was the product of local conflicts that had escalated to a point of desperation.